Just one question - How do you know?

I’m gonna say something weird. Something you’ve probably never heard anyone else say… you ready? Science requires just as much faith as religion. Don’t believe me? I had this debate the other day with a friend of mine (yes, I have friends). He is a proud ‘skeptic’, which just means that he doesn’t believe in God. That’s fine with me, but what bothered me were his reasons for not believing in God. He told me that it makes more sense to believe in science because there are many experiments that can verify theories. Science presents facts only, not beliefs. Science can be proven and demonstrated… where is the proof of God?

While I agree that there can never be a proof of God, I find it odd that people often pit science and religion against each other when all along, they both require the same thing – faith. What if I told you that my religion states that there are 11 dimension of reality? Sounds ridiculous, right? It’s hard to believe something that absurd. Well what if I told you that that was a bona fide theory of quantum mechanics? Is it easier to believe now? Or what if I said to you that when I flip a light switch, invisible beings dash across the room and dance in the light bulb? What if I called those beings ‘electrons’?

Before I continue, I am not trying to disprove science. I do not believe or buy into this false dichotomy where either the holy book or the science book is correct. I am someone who has no trouble believing in both God and evolution. This is not some “science is evil” trip. But I feel like we overlook an obvious question in our lives – ‘how do I know what I know?’ For example, I know that electrons exist. There is nothing in this world that can possibly make me doubt that they exist. But how do I know that? Yes there have been experiments to show that they exist, but I personally have never performed any of these experiments. So how do I know it? Why should I believe in something that I can never see or touch? The answer, when you cut through all of the BS, is that I know it because someone told me to believe it. Once upon a time, I sat in a science class and I decided to believe whatever the teacher told me. It’s as simple as that. On another occasion, the teacher stood in front of a group of people and, with a thick book in one hand, told us of the greatness of a man who had long since died. This man, my teacher explained, was a man who while sitting under a tree, discovered a great and all pervading force that binds us all. He was able to look at light and understand it, control it. He wasn’t some prophet or messenger, he was Isaac Newton. So now I wonder, really what’s the difference between him and Buddha? Why is it easier to believe in some invisible force, like gravity, but all other forces are off limits?

There are millions of things we take for granted on a daily basis; things that we just assume to be true. And hell, that’s a good thing. I assume that when I talk to a person, that person has a brain, for instance. We have to do this in order to function. Can you imagine what life would be like if we had to prove everything to ourselves every time? Proof is never a condition for belief; it’s the spice on top. We just believe because it helps us to navigate and function in our world. A common response that I hear to this is “well, why don’t you believe that magic fairies live in your garden? If you have no reason to reject magical fairies, why not believe in them?” The answer is that just because I cannot disprove something, it doesn’t mean that I must accept it as true. At the same time, if someone truly believed in magical fairies, then how is that anymore absurd than believing in electrons or protons?

It sounds ironic that science requires faith, and there is a reason why it does. The history behind the notion “religion vs. science” is not obscure – the Catholic Church, which dominated Europe for centuries, began to feel threatened by new scientists who could also explain how the world worked. The Church, in an effort to maintain its hegemony on Europe, waged a war against scientists... and the rest is history. People forget that some of the greatest scientists ever also believed in God (Ibn Sina, Mendel, and Einstein pop into mind). They were able to practice their religion while working in science. To them, and to many like me, there is no distinction. Science and Religion are not inherently incompatible with each other. They are treated as such by those who still buy into the idea that we must choose between one or the other. I can’t prove God, but I don’t need to in order to believe in Him… just like I don’t need to prove electrons (or super string theory or the big bang or...) Tweet